XBF: Gaming Daily
Happy Thursday ladies and Gentleman and welcome to the first of a hopefully Daily post featuring news and gossip from the world of Xbox and Gaming. So lets dive in chums but beware there be sharks and mermaid inside.
It’s all about Halo
We’re just over a month away from the worldwide release of Halo 5 Guardians in what will easily be Microsofts biggest launch since the Debut of the Xbox One and 343 industries are pulling back the curtain and allowing us some well planned sneak peeks behind the scenes. The past week has seen several gameplay trailers and snippets of the Levels involving both The Chiefs Blue Team and Spartan Lockes Fireteam Osiris.
It was perhaps the Halo 5 Blue Team Opening Cinematic that caused the biggest stir as it revealed the Chief appears to be struggling to come to terms with the loss of Cortana. The Cinematic has Fred questioning The Chiefs mental state and even has a brief glimpse of The Chief running his hand over the slot Cortana used to live in. It’s only small but it hints at a greater emotional story for the Master Chief which with the loss of Cortana may need to carry the story. It’s a brave departure from the largely silent empty vessel of the previous games but along with the changes to the traditional combat system and the inclusion of other Spartans Halo 5 is shaping up to be a real blockbuster.
Xbox New Experience
Xbox Lives Major Nelson and Richard Irving from the Xbox engineering team let us have a look at the Preview version of the New Xbox Dashboard and from the video shown it’s clear Microsoft are doing their best to improve what is currently a pretty crap experience. It’s a complete overhaul from the new home screen, guide button and Apps focused on improving speed and making finding content easier and faster than before. I personally really hate the current Dashboard i think it’s a total disaster and amazing when you think that Microsoft have been making UI’s for decades. It’s symptomatic of the Xbox Ones struggles since launch and getting it right will go along to making using the Xbox One a more enjoyable experience. I really liked the redesigned guide button and how responsive the apps were. Currently even the simplest task of opening your friends list involves a lengthy wait and once loaded it often freezes and feels unresponsive and super frustrating. From the video shown which was an early preview build it’s clearly a big improvement and it will be on General availability in November.
Tomb Raider Descent Into Legend Trailer
Hot on the heels of Halo is another game i can’t wait to get my grubby mitts on and that is of course the New Tomb Raider title that continues where the simply awesome Tomb Raider reboot. Rise of the Tomb Raider expands on the previous game offering improved Combat and greater room for exploration whilst keeping the brutal gameplay very much intact. One of the few complaints from the last title was the lack of Tomb’s and the more linear progression but that was all part of the plan. ROTR is a more traditional Tomb Raider game as it features more exploration, more tombs, more crafting and more mystery.
Exciting times for us Xbox Owners with 2 huge Exclusives coming in the next 2 months along with a redesigned Dashboard things are really looking up for the Xbox One. With no real competition this Xmas Microsoft can take advantage and build some real momentum going into 2016.
